My old man is pretty old school; the tough love type. So with this context you can imagine how he laughed when I tried explaining to him how ‘stressful’ student life can be. Of course, according to him we’re lazy; why would we be stressed out? Yet I don’t think I was being overly sensitive for the sake of garning some useless sympathy. I’m quite sure I was making a valid point. Moreover I’m a history student who lives with physicists. They joke about how they do a ‘proper’ degree, and I often join in. I enjoy five ambitiously labelled ‘contact’ hours a week, that’s plenty of time to relax, no?
That’s right, no. What I’ve noticed is no matter how hard I try these days, the blissful embrace of relaxation no longer seems to be with me, in fact it’s becoming quite stressful trying to relax at all.
At first I couldn’t figure out why, but I’m beginning to have some ideas. One thing really stands out. I call it ‘the Guilt’, I’m sure we’re all familiar with it. It comes with knowing that no matter what, I probably should be more productive, efficient or (braces for knock-out blow) responsible. In layman’s terms I should probably be doing some reading. Well I tried this, I did what I was instructed to, I wasn’t lazy, did my essay and I handed it in quite comfortably. It didn’t work. Despite my crusade against the label of lazy the Guilt was still there, knocking on the door that represents my conscience. Reminding me to sort out the bills, or ring my long suffering grandmother to find out what happened two valleys down from our home in the Welsh sticks… Guilt.
Being the adult I am, I tried running away from this for a couple of hours. I tried having fun. At first I felt going out would help, change of scene, change of pace. Wrong. I increased my stress levels by saying things that inhibition had previously prohibited, and was £30 worse off than I was before… Guilt. Even more than this I can’t help but feeling that more stress is caused by the attempt to have fun. It often seems more important to be ‘seen’ as having fun than to actually relax and just enjoy yourself.
Yet I don’t need to tell you this do I? I like listening to people, and from what I gather my experience is hardly unique. In fact it seems quite common, I hope that most people reading this recognise my point, yet I fear most of you are giving a knowing and familiar sigh. I try explaining that students will always pursue ‘nice’. We buy nice food, nice clothes, nice DVDs, or nice booze. All in an attempt to relax, but it doesn’t work. Because the Guilt is still there, you know you shouldn’t have bought (insert needless luxury here), because you’re a student. You can’t justify it, especially as you edge ever closer to the point where your overdraft isn’t an occasional safety net, it’s become a dangerous lover.
I’m not sure why the Guilt is now a part of my life, it seemed to grasp my shoulders someday between now and last October and it’s got a good grip. My fear is that this is the future. Frank Skinner recently hit upon this issue. He talked about how being fifty didn’t scare him. As he’d gotten older he felt more comfortable within himself. It wasn’t that life getting easier, he concluded that it wasn’t a lot of unnecessary effort any more.
Perhaps this is far more to do with how hard it is to relax as a student. The daily proxy of being independent and adult gets in the way. We’re in a pretty privileged position and I don’t think we take that for granted, indeed I don’t think most of us would consider ourselves lazy despite how we may joke about it. Perhaps it’s because we realise that this can’t go on forever; we worry if we’re enjoying it to the best of our ability. Or if we’re achieving the best we absolutely could. Because, if our mystical elders (parents) are correct, we won’t have a time like this again. Well at least until we’re fifty and no longer care.